Agri-tourism, sports eyed in Davao Occidental

Subscribe Now June 05, 2014 at 11:21am

AGRI-tourism as well as culture and sports were identified to promote and boost Davao Occidental's economy, an official said.

Board member Jason John A. Joyce, who guested in Tuesday's Davao Business Forum at Dermpath at SM City Davao, said these were identified by the collective efforts of the tourism officers in the province and tourism industry stakeholders.

"We also conducted a profiling of the tourist destinations and tourism development areas in the municipalities of Davao del Sur and the soon to be Davao Occidental," said Joyce who also chairs the committee of Tourism of the Davao del Sur provincial council.

He also said these were also identified after they had a meeting with the Department of Tourism.

Joyce said instead of developing new tourism destinations, they opted to first prioritize and develop what has been existing.
They are pushing the Municipality of Kiblawan which has an Eco-Park and a model farm on organic farming. Other areas they are promoting is Kapatagan, wood carvers of Sta. Cruz, white sand beaches of Sta. Maria, and the tarsiers and dugong of Malita, among others.

As for Davao Occidental, they are promoting different culture and sports activities tourists can enjoy like game fishing in Jose Abad Santos and scuba diving in their waters.

Currently, they are developing the first Tourism Code of the province with a focus on protecting the environment.

Joyce said they are looking at the tourism codes of Davao City, Palawan, and other provinces in Davao Region as basis for drafting the code.